Food and Party Time in Beijing

Food and Party Time in Beijing

Oh gosh! I’m writing this blog post before I’m even done editing the video. There’s so much footage for us to edit and I’m not even sure what I’m going to include or not. I’m just really excited about what our trip was like and I want to talk about it.

Why We Were There

Why go to Beijing, you might ask. We were surprised when we were invited as well. YouTube is blocked in China, and so I wonder why would anyone want us there if they don’t know who we are? Here’s why: the event was actually organized by people in Germany, people responsible for the Frankfurt Book Fair. They were organizing StoryDrive Asia in China. The point of the conference was to talk about Transmedia and different ways of storytelling. We, then, were invited to talk about how we include you guise in our videos.

Basically, the idea behind it is that we’re not like Game of Thrones. You can’t call up the directors and say “hey! Joffrey’s an asshole! Kill him right away!” Old media is very much a one way street. For us and our videos, though, we try to be more of a two way street. We answer your questions in our TL;DRs, and we respond to your comments in the videos as well. We take your votes for Kpop Music Monday. We chat with you guise and open your packages during LiveChats. You guise aren’t our audience in a traditional sense. We treat you more like friends we’re having a conversation with. There you go. That’s the gist of our presentation. Of course, it had us being more active and moving around the stage and showing videos and stuff.

We were presenting right after a really famous lady talked for an hour about the importance of incorporating discussions of Chinese characters when you try to tell foreigners what China was like. She was very, very, very, very thorough. She’s a professor, so she gave a very formal lecture. Then us two dorks came up on stage and ho-hummed and jigged for a bit. Ta-da! We never claimed to be professional :D

But, really, we had a fantastic time there. The presentations we listened to were awesome. We made some really good friends there. I hope they’re reading this today. Syd, Colin, Triona, Gavin, Pete, Claudius: you guys were awesome! We’ll hopefully visit you when we go to Europe this year!

Ahem. So, outside of the presentation, we did other stuff

The Other Stuff We Did

WE ATE A LOT. Did you get that from the video? We ate lots of food. That’s really the most important thing for us whenever we travel to other countries. Tourist attractions are for tourists, not for locals. We don’t want to experience that. We want to do what local people do. So we eat everything we can find. We’re not afraid to get diarrhoeas as well. Give us the local experience! Fortunately, this trip didn’t result in any of that, so…great success! And also, too much information!

We went to a really cool bar that Robin emailed us about, Great Leap Brewing. Seriously the coolest bar we went to in Asia. Korea’s microbrewing scene is starting to grow, and we know a few places that make good beer, but this place had not only lots of great beer, but it also had a GIANT bar with a great vibe. Check it out if you’re in Beijing. I’m not sure how to describe how to get there. We just hopped in the Rickshaw and had our babysitters take us there. Yay!

We Break Weather Everywhere We Go

When we were in Canada we brought about -40 degree weather, which was a record, and we also brought an ice storm that broke Christmas. Then we went to Japan for a weekend and brought about a record breaking ice storm. Then, for our few days in Beijing, we brought about record breaking heat. Whyyyyyy???? LA, be prepared for the carnage coming your way. We realized that we have a special mutant power to ruin weather. Call us by our new mutant name: CALAMITY!

We Took Lots of Pictures

Also, we have so many pictures! Hopefully you like the pretty layout we just put in. Check it out!

Need masks for the bad air

Trying to figure out how to Twitter and Facebook here.

Our first meal in Beijing. Hell yeah we’re going for Peking duck!

This is what we were here for, after all

We’re about to go on stage and we’re a bit nervous

Now we can cut loose!

The place was called In & Out, and it was lovely

Seriously gorgeous here. We were amazed

This was the walk to the bathroom in the restaurant. The bathroom was a squatter, but the walk there at least was nice

Oh man: everyone we were with loved this. It was glorious. What is this called? Can we make it here? HOW?!

We ate a lot

Soju is under 20% alcohol. This is FIFTY FREAKING SIX. It tasted like burning.

Our hotel was lovely, and offered us this at the door when they gave us our wake up call.

The pillows were so soft!

Why do we always bring the worst weather with us?

I am not happy

Not the clearest of skies, but we still liked our view

So meta

The selfie behind the picture of the selfie

Had lots of this here

Maybe normal to you, but we thought it looked really cool

We went for unlimited dim sum. Hell yeah we wrecked it!

Need moar dim sum

It looked cool so we took a picture of it.

Big pimpin spendin G’s!

He encouraged us to sing more. Probably to stop us from panicking from the cars about to kill us.

Really having a lot of fun in the back of this thing. Wish Korea had it!

We went for beers with some new friends we made, Gavin and Colin. They were great fun.

We got an email from Robin recommending this place. IT WAS GREAT!

Great selection of yummy beers.

I wonder what the slogan is in Chinese…

We’re always amazed at what we find in other countries’ McDonalds

Cool little statue we found outside of a shop

We left the touristy area and found this lovely area to walk around in

This was a really cool area that had traditional housing, and a Starbucks right in it. Then it got really crowded and touristy so we ran for it.

It’s too hot to walk. The dog knows this. The humans don’t

My ducky!

Naked flames. Ha.

Hello

We saw this cute doggie and played with it, and the owner was really friendly too

Great sign at a nice little coffee shop

We were in the “hip” area, we were told, and so we saw cool stuff like this everywhere

It’s more food!

And it was scalding hot!

Cops and Army EVERYWHERE!

What was this area called? I don’t remember. It was close to Tiananmen Square

That guy. Turning on the AC. That’s what he’s doing.

Yep a gate

Selfie!

Korea’s real estate is really cramped, so there’s no room for big, cool buildings, but Beijing had it everywhere.

These dumplings were the best we had on our whole trip

Delish!

We Have Bloopers

We had like two hours of footage but didn’t air all of it. Here’s some of the stuff that didn’t make the final cut.

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I love Peking Duck. In the States, whenever my family and I would go to a Chinese restaurant, we had to order it ahead of time. After I moved to Toronto, my parents, aunt, uncle and cousins were all out for Chinese food and I found Peking Duck on the menu. Imagine my surprise when I realized we didn’t have to give them notice that we wanted it. I ordered it. They brought out the entire cooked duck to show me (which grossed one of my cousins out a bit) before they took it away and cut it up. Hot damn, it was delicious.

I am with Convoluted! Bring some rain to SoCal! I live in Orange County, we’re in such a serious drought the electronic road signs are asking people to conserve water. Thanks! (Except you’re already here, I think!)

Can you bring some rain when you come to California? Even though I live in northern California, maybe your awesome powers over the weather will make it rain all over the whole state. We’re having a drought here, so we need rain really badly. Thanks! :)

I’m a student in China,and I’m a native Beijinger.Beijing is a city that the foreigners should visit with a local.There are a lot of good restaurants and awesome place which are very secret.About the taxis,recently there are many apps came out to catch a cab.So if you see an empty taxi,you wave,it probably won’t stop.It’s quite difficult to get a taxi without an app in Beijing.And sometimes,the sellers will raise the prices to the foreigners.Most of the restaurants you’ve mentioned are not the restaurants that Beijingers are familiar with.I also saw some subscribers said about 798,that’s a great place to go,and there’s a place called sanlitun village，you can see many foreigners.Luhan often goes there when he ‘s free in Beijing.There must be many mistakes in my sentences,just ignore it……I’m not good at English╮(╯▽╰)╭

No, your English is great! Thanks for the tips for Beijing – my second favourite city after Seoul (of course…) I agree with the taxi app – I really like the ‘taxi card’ ones but I haven’t tried the ones to hire a taxi. Next trip!

My boyfriend was very interested since he’s Chinese and wanted to know what you thought. He quickly realised that the majority of what you guys did was eat and at the 9:57 mark saw what was coming a mile off and he laughed for a long time haha.

OMFG I remember about 10 years ago my parents were having a party and my dad and violin teacher decided to do some shots with baijiu (except it was about 80% concentrated instead of 60%) and I thought it was water so I took a whole shot by accident… I couldn’t even cry because I was so shocked for about 5 minutes. My expression was literally XOO

So much wanderlust! Lovely video – I really enjoyed this format. Also wonderful that you were able to roam around so much. I can’t travel any other way than to get lost. Once caved in to joining a tour group with some friends for the cheaper tickets but never again. I escaped only to come back for the ride home, ha!

HI NASTY-FAMILY :)
So I try it out here – hope I can get an answer – would have been THE BEST :) From any one that knows a good tip for this question :D!! ANY will do!!!
We have finally (my guy and me) – STILL LOONG WAY TO GO – BUT FOR REAL – booked a trip to Seoul for next year!!! We will be going to Seoul for 3 weeks – and cant tell you how happy I am right now. Still a million years to go – but happy that we finally have booked the hotel :D :D :) (SCREAMING OUT LOUD VERY HAPPILY)!! Any way, enough of happyscreaming (cant wake up the neighbours) – to my question:
My boyfriend is having his birthday soon – and I want to give him something special (were a bit older – cant tell you how much older – but yeah…) and I want to give him something really special! I have tried to look in to do something in Seoul and was thinking of take a trip on Han River. Can only find a bit of info about it (but really old ones from 2010/2011) – and cant enter the website or se any information about the actual booking or an private boat trip.. so anyone got any info on this?? Some write that you dont need to book – and some write that you do! Please tell me if you have any information or tip about this or renting a private boat for Han River!! THANK YOU!!

First, congrats on the upcoming stupidly amazing fun balls time you are about to have. You might get to visit the new EYK Cafe if you are in the right time frame?!

Second, I haven’t done the Hangang cruises but try options like the Hangang River Ferry and the Hangant Excursion boat — both have details on visitseoul.net and visitkorea websites, as well as TripAdvisor. A colleague also mentioned Seoul Marina for private boat charter, if that’s what you are looking for. Try your concierge if Korean is a bit tricky (or one of the phone numbers for international translation, there are quite a lot for Korea) or you might try a tour company? I don;t personally love rout companies but I adore Ongo Food Communications (Ongo Food Tours), so if you are looking for something special try a private or group tour with them (they might be able to arrange a boat tour) but you will probably have one of their extremely cool guides with you (great for fun, maybe not so much for the boomshakalaka romance factor). I have experience with these guys and cannot recommend more highly (not sponsored in any way, I swear!)

Hi Rardnas — I can’t reply to your comment but good luck! Seoul is my favourite city to travel to (obviously) and you will have a great time. Don’t forget to pick up Mustoy souvenirs – there’s something really special about selecting one that has been left by someone else randomly. I don’t know who painted mine but I like the mystery and that they live here in another country now!

Thank you sooo much for the answer!!! :D Looked into visitseoul.net and Ongo Food Communications – found what I needed in 30 secs :D Im gonna “go shopping” today – and make the call outside our appartment – cant have him hearing stuff from the other room. Perfect present and with the help from you I got exactly what I needed!! Thank thanks thanks (heheheh know the feeling with editing button)!

ITS sooo freaking awsome to have the trip booked for next year!! I cant wait, let it be year 2015 – way to much time left until July next year…. :S
It is a must to visit their new EYK Cafe – Im gonna live there (scchhhhhh dont tell them thats our plan) ;) Have made the awsomest hugest list of everything we have to do from the EYK-videos that they have made. The list of everything they have eaten!! Its t h i best! :)
(Thank you) Were gonna eat and drink until someone needs to roll us back to the hotel XD

I’ve never been to China, but this video made me miss Taiwan quite a bit ;_; luckily I’ll be going back in a few weeks hehe ^^ If you guys ever get a chance to go to Taiwan, you’d probably go crazy because the food is just so good XD

I really love that you guys do videos like this when you go to other countries! It’s so interesting to see what other countries are like as well as Korea. I do have a question though: how do you guys wander around other countries and not get lost?! I have no sense of direction and would most likely be completely lost and wandering around the streets of China or Japan forever and never find my way back to the hotel. What’s your secret?!

Well, it’s always a good idea to take the business card of the hotel/motel/hostel/whatever you’re staying in. As soon as we get to it we drop a pin on our iPhones. Then, we’re just set loose in an area and walk around until we get exhausted. Soon enough we find a street that has taxis :D

well hopefully you won’t bring about a record breaking earthquake, something that goes out of the richter scale… I’m going to be going back home to cali this summer, and that’s one experience I could do without. thank you. hahahaha. but really please don’t. XD

I would have liked to see and heard more of the history behind some of the places you visited in the video in your blog post. Like why was that place considered hipster, what was the reasoning behind some of the food choices (other then peking duck hahha we knew about that), etc

You guys are awesome I always feel great while watching your videos ..oh yeah I made a drawing of Martina and posted it on Instagram I also mentioned you and tagged you in it you guys should go check it out and tell me what you think about it .

Ah yes, Chinese rice wine. The first time i tried it I stuck my finger in it to see if I would like the taste, and it stripped my nail polish clean off. Good times, good times… I think (can’t actually remember much of Beijing after night on the rice wine, actually).

Wow! This was the ULTIMATE in food pr0n! It all looks so yummy and now I have a craving to go to Toronto go for giant dim sum Sunday brunch…oh, if only…… I think you were really lucky with the street food because (a) you had legit Chinese guides with you and (b) you didn’t try to go to the very touristy areas. A lot of street food is generally okay if the customers are steady but when I was in the Shanghai open market (very touristy), all three times I was there, I saw a vendor fish a half-eaten plate of food out of the trash, give it a quick lookover, then put parts of it on a new plate. Brrrrrr!

I really like the quality of the video and content when you guys are just filming in the street without heavy makeup (probably would melt off anyways) and just capturing sniper shots of action as it happens. I know that you edit it later and the effects add fun but the pure camera action is usually so captivating.

omg next time you go you should definitely go there!! Its really cool and trendy! Hehe you guys also should eat at hai di lao hot pot and like dadong duck (probably the best)and also gui street (which is like a street full of restaurants and open till really late)!!! Omg I love Beijing (aside from the air lol) hehehe

I’m an ABC, and I have been to China many times, and I can confidently say that you guys ate some mighty funky food in that second restaurant. I have never ever even heard of green and orange dumplings with potatoes inside, and I have no idea what the platters filled with random assorted stuff is, though it does look pretty good. I did recognize the alcohol you tried, although I haven’t seen any with over 50% alcohol content before. The dim sum looked amazing and authentic, give me some NOW :D
Anyway, I feel like people in China as a whole care less about how they appear in public, so there are people who roll their shirts up and children who run around sparsely dressed in less cultured families. As far as traffic is concerned, its pretty terrible, just don’t get killed. OTL

I’m going to Beijing in 2 weeks, and will be staying there for 7 months. All the food shown in this video almost made me cry because I really want all of it!
I’m not looking forward to the air though.. I

Damn, I am a Chinese, but I have never been in Beijing before. And all those yummy Chinese food you guys put in the video are seriously making me “homesick”, well “home-food-sick”. I came from Shanghai, currently living in South Africa.

As far as I have noticed, driving in Shanghai, to my opinion, is just as bad as in Beijing, but South Africa – Johannesburg has some other kind of “bad”. We have a type of transport called Taxis, nope, not taxi cabs, Taxi – a VW combi or caddy (don’t know what it’s officially called) carrying a lot of people (I mean really large amount of people) at once. The drivers of those vehicles are particularly “skillful” in -hum- all ways, I have seen sliding doors fall off while letting passengers get off, overload and overturned (usually happen when going too fast while overloaded). But fortunately, with regular vehicles, they are considerably safe compare to China.

As for showing belly and nipples in public, I would say I haven’t seen it in years, not in South Africa nor Shanghai at least. Here was the thing, I had a friend from Beijing, he came and visit me once while I was in Shanghai, he did that belly thing (yes, including roll up the T-Shirt, scratch and tap on belly, grrr…) after having dinner in the restaurant. I was really shocked. I wonder if it could be a Beijing thing… hmmm…

Finally I had to agree with the air quality in China, every time I go visit my family in Shanghai, I just had to be sick in some way. The last time I went back to visit, I started coughing for no reason from the third day. Then I got better as soon as I landed in Dubai for transit, stopped coughing completely when I landed in Johannesburg. Strange. I blame it on the air quality.

By the way, I love what you guys do and please keep doing it. You are awesome!